IQ Remote vs IQ 4 Night Behavior difference on photo frame

Hello.
I have an IQ 4 Panel downstairs and an IQ Remote PowerG upstairs. I have the photo frame settings the same on both. However they don’t actually behave the same way.

I have night timeframes setup, and I have the boxes checked to turn off everything except the LED’s at night.
On the IQ 4 Panel, if I go to disarm the panel during this night timeframe, everything is silent - no button press beeps while entering the code, and the system disarms completely silently. (This is good and what I want)
However, if I disarm the system on the upstairs IQ Remote, I get beeps when typing my disarm code, and then both panels announce “System disarmed by second floor panel”. (Which I don’t want)

Why is this working differently on the remote vs the main IQ 4 when the settings are the same?

Also, I will say that every once in a blue moon, the upstairs panel WILL be silent, but it’s happened that way only twice or three times in the 6 months I’ve had it. I have a feeling this is a bug. But what do you think?

Thank you

Happy to assist.

Can you confirm the FW on the IQ Remote?
Settings > Advanced Settings > About > Software

I’m going to do some testing to see if I can recreate the issue and find a resolution. I will follow up shortly.

Hi Tyler,

The remote is SW: 4.5.2

Thank you

Thank you for your patience. I am able to recreate on the same system/firmware.

To confirm, a system status change (Arming/Disarming) will wake the remote. This is intentional. During an Arm Away from the IQP4, the IQRPG will beep during arming countdown.

You can Arm Away from the IQP4 using Silent Arming. This will mute the exit beep sounds during Arm Away but the IQRPG screen will still light up. However, when disarming the countdown beep cannot be avoided.

Currently there is no way to prevent the IQRPG screen from illuminating during arming/disarming.

I have passed along to Qolsys a feature request to keep the IQ Remote screen off and beeps silent during night time mode unless its physically interacted with or there is an alarm state. I could not say whether or not this would be implemented.

Sorry if I confused you… That actually that wasn’t my issue. (I don’t experience countdown beeps)

In this case I was Arm STAY, and I have no countdown beeps when disarming. The ‘beeps’ I mentioned I should have said that they were more of the “tick” noises each keypress makes when you type the 4 digits of your disarm code. The main IQ4 doesn’t do keypad “ticks” in night mode, but the IQ Remote does !?

The other issue (and the big issue) is that when you disarm from the arm STAY state at night, the voice announcement of “System disarmed by second floor panel” wakes up the house. But it only does that when you disarm from the IQ Remote. If I do the same disarm on the IQ 4, it makes no such voice announcement and is totally silent (as it should be)

As for the screen lighting up, I understand and don’t care about that.

So the real crux of the issue here is that the voice announcements are still being made even though night mode should prevent them on the IQ Remote. The IQ 4 Panel is honoring that setting, but not the remote.

(This is all about trying to let the dog out at 3-5am without waking anyone)

Thanks for the clarification.

The other issue (and the big issue) is that when you disarm from the arm STAY state at night, the voice announcement of “System disarmed by second floor panel” wakes up the house. But it only does that when you disarm from the IQ Remote.

I am not able to recreate this through Arm Stay. How are you arming the panel when this occurs? Locally (at which panel) or remotely?

I can confirm that if I disarm at the IQ Remote from Arm Away, the panel announces “system is now disarmed.”

How do you have the IQ Remote paired with the IQ Panel 4, via PowerG or via Wi-Fi?

The main IQ4 doesn’t do keypad “ticks” in night mode, but the IQ Remote does !?

Touch Sounds, the feedback noise when pressing buttons, This can be outright disabled on the IQ Panel 4 but there is no setting on the IQ Remote. I can confirm that the sounds still occur during night time mode. This may be an oversight.

I have reached out to Qolsys to confirm and to see if there is a workaround and/or if this is a known issue.

Hi Tyler,
I just PM’ed you a video showing the exact scenario. Hopefully that is easier than my text descriptions.

to answer your other questions

  • the IQ Remote is connected via Wifi.
  • We usually arm (as you will see in the video) by arming Stay from either the IQ 4 or the IQ Remote. We never really arm stay by the app.
  • Understood about the touch sounds and countdown beeps… those are fine. Like I said its the voice I wished would go away on night time disarm.

Thank you.

Thank you for the follow up and clarification. We are working with Qolsys to see if this is a known issue and if it is being addressed in firmware or if there are workarounds.

We are still waiting on some information from Qolsys regarding the described issue. We will follow up as soon as we have more information from them.

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Sorry for the delay here. A few things:

When I previously tested, I was unable to duplicate the voice announcement during disarm. IQ Remote was connected via PowerG. Once I switched the connection to Wi-Fi, I can replicate.

Qolsys indicates that by design, when system wide status changes happen (such as Arm to Disarm) it should vocalize, even when Night Time Mode is active. They indicate the lack of announcement when connected via PowerG is a bug.

Unfortunately, there is not a work around for the voice annunciation at this time.

A request to disable the vocalization during Night Time mode has been made to Qolsys. I could not say if/when this would be implemented.

Additionally, some changes and bug fixes are coming to both night time mode as well as the IQ Remote, in the upcoming firmware 4.6.0. There is not ETA for that but you can subscribe to the post below to be notified when 4.6.0 patch notes are added.

Thank you. Interesting that they say it should vocalize at all times but the main panel doesn’t?? If it was intentional I’d think the iq4 would be the same way. No big deal just odd.

Thanks again for looking into this.

A related question: what are the benefits of joining the remote via PowerG vs WiFi? I seem to remember there was a reason I chose WiFi - I thought something didn’t work with PowerG connection- was it maybe doorbell camera streaming?? Can’t recall. But if you could point me to an article on that I’d appreciate it. Just want to make sure I have it connected the right way.

Thank you!!

In order to Live Stream with compatible cameras at the IQ Remote, the secondary panel needs to be connected via Wi-Fi. You might be referenceing this post?

The main benefit to pairing via PowerG is going to be increased communication distance.

Yes! That was it. The live streaming.
So given that info I’m good with the WiFi connection.

Thanks for finding that!